Why I Am Not Watching the Super Bowl
Feb. 1st, 2015 09:06 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
sdelmonteLet's be up front about this. I still like football. I have been watching since I was 6. I was glad when the Giants didn't fire their coach, thrill to Odell Beckham Jr.'s catches, and can tell you the names of most players in the game today.
But I am in the middle of a slow and painful divorce from the sport. Why? Part of it is that the scandals that have hit the sport this season and the NFL's response reveal an organization that is pretty corrupt from top to bottom. Part of it is that at some level, I am a pacifist and have to wonder if I am hypocrite for liking any form of organized violence (and yes, I know that I read superhero comics, but one thing at a time). And most of it about concussions. About how playing the sport increases the chance that you will get brain damage. About how the NFL covered this up, and still insists that the game can be made safe. And about how I am pretty sure that there is no way to make it safe.
So this season, I followed what was going on. I listened to a few games. I knew all the stuff I used to know. But I never once turned on the TV to watch. Yes, when my father in law visited and turned the games on, I watched. And I knew that I missed watching even the meaningless games. But I never chose to pick up that remote once.
And I plan to pull back even further. Which will be hard because to follow sports in America is to follow football. It dominates the conversation. You want news about other sports, you have to sit through the football news first. I might end up quitting some part of my sports fandom in order to get football out of my system. After listening to sports talk radio from the day it was invented, that will be hard.
But I think I have to do this. Football is bad for the people who play it, and therefore we should not encourage anyone to play it. Which is, as far as I can tell, very much a minority opinion. If anything, football got MORE popular this year. Despite the scandals. Despite the arrests and the incompetence and the racist team name that isn't going away and everything else. And despite the concussions. When I tell people how I feel, a lot of them look at me like I am from Mars. But I am sure that I need to quit football fandom.
So tonight, I will not put on the game. It helps that I don't care about either team. And that I don't care about the ads anymore. But that doesn't change my feeling. It won't be easy, especially if the Giants get good again, but I think I have to do this.
But I am in the middle of a slow and painful divorce from the sport. Why? Part of it is that the scandals that have hit the sport this season and the NFL's response reveal an organization that is pretty corrupt from top to bottom. Part of it is that at some level, I am a pacifist and have to wonder if I am hypocrite for liking any form of organized violence (and yes, I know that I read superhero comics, but one thing at a time). And most of it about concussions. About how playing the sport increases the chance that you will get brain damage. About how the NFL covered this up, and still insists that the game can be made safe. And about how I am pretty sure that there is no way to make it safe.
So this season, I followed what was going on. I listened to a few games. I knew all the stuff I used to know. But I never once turned on the TV to watch. Yes, when my father in law visited and turned the games on, I watched. And I knew that I missed watching even the meaningless games. But I never chose to pick up that remote once.
And I plan to pull back even further. Which will be hard because to follow sports in America is to follow football. It dominates the conversation. You want news about other sports, you have to sit through the football news first. I might end up quitting some part of my sports fandom in order to get football out of my system. After listening to sports talk radio from the day it was invented, that will be hard.
But I think I have to do this. Football is bad for the people who play it, and therefore we should not encourage anyone to play it. Which is, as far as I can tell, very much a minority opinion. If anything, football got MORE popular this year. Despite the scandals. Despite the arrests and the incompetence and the racist team name that isn't going away and everything else. And despite the concussions. When I tell people how I feel, a lot of them look at me like I am from Mars. But I am sure that I need to quit football fandom.
So tonight, I will not put on the game. It helps that I don't care about either team. And that I don't care about the ads anymore. But that doesn't change my feeling. It won't be easy, especially if the Giants get good again, but I think I have to do this.
